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ARGO AND IRENE, 



Dramatic Ceipisitiee, 



By Dr. J. R. Monroe. 



Seymour, Indiana, June, 1874. 



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Entered^ according to Act of Congress, in the vear 181 

By JASPER R, MONROE, M. D., 
In the office of Librarian of Congress, Washingto 
D.~C. x 







* ABGO AND IRENE. 

1 



DRAMATIS PERSONJE. 

Argo, a poet. Irene. 

Magoon* an old man of low Mother to Irene. 

babits, but a millionare. Lawyer. 

Notary Public. Critic. 

Publisher. Dr. Smick. 

Dr. Spanker. Dr. Slabbs. 

Tubes. Dr. Abram Turner, (Colored.) 

Two Old Ladies. Servant to Irene, (Colored.) 

Two Servants, Friends and Attendants. 

ACT I. 

SCENE I. A Ladies Room. Irene seated at a Table. Enter 

Servant with Letters. 

Serv. I hab youh letters, Miss Irene. You gets a heap ob 
lub letters, but you is a lubbly young lady. You is de lub- 
bliest ob de lubbly and de sweetest ob de sweetly. 

Irene. Why, what insolence ! 

Serv. Insolence ? 

Irene. Yes, insolence, you black scamp ! 

Serv. Black scamp ? Look a heah, Miss ; Ize a gemmen, if 
I is culled ! 

Irene. You a gentleman ! Ain't you a nigger ? 

Serv. Niggah ! niggah, Miss! dar be no niggahs now. 
True nuff, Ize culled, but Ize no niggah. Ize a gemmen ob 
cullah. Massa Linkum wiped out de stigma ob niggah. Ize 
de ekal ob de white man in 'spectability and 'telligenee. 

Irene. Yes ? 

Serv. Yes, Miss, I is ; de law gibs me ekality before it and 
behind it, and Ize gwine to hab my rights. I admires youh 
beauty, bad as you treats me, and I hab a right to 'spress my 
feelins if I is culled and is youh servant, Niggah, to be 
shuah ! 

Irene. Well, well Sam, I'm not going to fall out with you. 
See if my mother does't want you below. 

Serv. All right, $liss ; Ize not mad, I ges wanted to show 
you dat I hab de spirit ob a man, if I is culled, and dat I is 
a warm 'mirer ob de female sec, ob whom you is de perfec- 
tion dareof. [Exit. 

Irene. Alas, what have we come to in this country, 



When all the servants think themselves the equal 
Of those whom they do serve. Can we raise them 
To our refinement and intelligence ? 
Or will we rather, by the force of habit, 
Through constant commerce with the serving class. 
Sink to their level ? But this sooty fellow 
Admires my beauty ; in his amorous eye, 
(Looks in the glass.) 
There lives a critic who doth say : She pretty ; 
And. compliments unto a woman's beauty, 
Are sweet to the possessor of that beauty, 
Nor can she wholly hate the man who pays them, 
Though he were seven times black. 

( Opens a letter and reads.) 

TO MY HEART'S IDOL. 



How slight a circumstance may blast, 
The blossoms the young heart puts forth^ 

And tender buds of hope— how fast 
They fall in frosts of frigid north. 

This morn our wishes are in flower, 

Amid the golden harvest sheaves, 
But ere the noon come blight and shower, 

And we have but the wilted leaves. 

heart of lover, doubting still, 

And never peaceful and at rest, 
But ever wooing omens ill 

To weigh upon the weary breast. 

there arc moments when the heart, 

Th.3 lover's quick barometer, 
Doth feel the death ere yet the dart 

Hath left the string whence it doth whir* 

ARGO, 

Alack, what means this riddle ? how is this ? 

Doth he spy out the evils that await him ? 

By intuition hath his fruitful mind 

Some dread forebodement ? there is a sadness — 

An air of plaintive wailing in his song 

That falls like funeral dirge. It breaks my heart. 

I who do love him, but must still betray him, 

Do feel the force of his great spirit more, 

The farther I go from him. 

( Opens another letter and reads.)' 
Dear Duck. — I have just returned from Europe, and shall 
call upon you to-day. I aurglacl you have kept the affair be- 
tween us so quiet that the quid-nuncs havn't got wind of it. 
Have a kiss of welcome for me, Love. 



Have a kiss for me, 
Have one two three ; 

I have scores for thee, 
And will spend them as free 
As the waters that run. 

re, Duck, that is the first poetry I ever put upon \ a; 
ore I ain fifty- nine years of age last Wednesday. 
Thh;e- own true penny, 

M. Magoox, Major* 
( Throw? all flic Ictfrrs pettishly aside) 
•lfty-nihe onWednesday. how sad 
To. see the old man lighting ofi his years, 
I And faded dames in the deeUne of life, 
With artificial teeth and withered limbs, 
In gay attire and sallow cheek in paint, 
Still aping youth and keeping time at bay, 
t Forswearing half the years that speak against them, 
And yielding, when compelled to, without grace.. 
To the behests of age ; this is pitable. 
But still poor human nature may be pardoned, 
For lovely is our youth, our ago decrepit ; 
^And not till youth hath slipped away and left us, 
I age, with ache and blindness and white kai^s, 
Doth creep upon us do we value youth. 
No wonder then that the old man should stri7e, 
To keep avray the years, and sweat and. tug 
r With every faculty that flags or fails him, 
ivorry or to woo it to performance 
As in the flower of youth. 

Exter Mother. 

^ Mother. I have good news, daughter. A note from 31 

^Magoon informs me of , his safe return from abroad, and 
he will presently call upon us. 

". I have his autograph : he tells me here 
That he will call and claim me for his wife : 

iJKnd he hath written me a pretty song ; 
T?or loving me hath made him court the muses ,* 
And I intend t® sefVne song to music 
And play it to the fiddle at the wedding, 
And by the murmuring brook beneath the willows. 

t Mother. Now, Irene, I would ! But I am glad to so€ 
are reconciled to the match. Give me the Major's -_ g 
ids it.) A pretty song, I do declare. It is quite equal to 
any of the mad poet's productions. When you are Mrs. Ma- 
goon we shall be enabled to regain our lost position i): 

Jt will be a splendid match. It will be the sensation of 

on. You will be envied by the entire tribe of marriage 

blc ladies in the city. The Major's great wealth will put. u:- 

in a position to return with interest the many slights that 

have been shown us since your father's bankruptcy aaddeatl . 



He is really a good-hearted, jolly old gentleman, and will : 
keep you from despondency ; and then if you should lose him : 
in a few years you have his wealth. He has no heirs and 
proposes to will all to you before the marriage. 

Irene. But mother bears he not a naughty name ? 
They say he is the patron of light women, 
And thinks the best of us but little better 
Than those with whom he herds. Hath he not mistresses? " 

Mother. Well what of that? He is not worse than most * 
men on that score. 

Irene. I've seen tobacco juice on his white beard ; 
He tipples, too, and smokes a sickening pipe ; 
And snores I think, and has the night mare, too ; 
And his fat belly comes down 10 his knees 5 
He eats enormously, is coarse of speech, 
And gross and sensual in his appetites. 
How can I wive with him ? 

Mother. Nonsense, daughter ; Ho not think of these 
things. You can conquer his appetites. He is but mortal 
man. Refuse him if you will, but only your marriage with 
him will save us from beggary. I wish myself there were 
some other deliverance for us, but there is none. what is to 
become of us ! 

Irene. Do not despair, dear mother ; now suppose, 
I sell myself to this old man ? — what then ? 
What will become of Argo and of you ? 
A/go will suicide, and can you hope 
A; mother-in-law to lead a happy life 

such a son-in-law ? Will not his wassail — 
His retinue of rioutious old men, with daily feast 
And nightly drinking bout, make you distract, 
a if he give you shelter ? 
Mather. Not so fast, girl. The Major agrees to make a 
settlement upon me before the marriage. I shall have a 
home and be independent. As for Argo, the young man is 
muddied in his wits, and is so regarded ; and his" prospects are 
so poor that it matters little what he doets or thinks. 

Irene. But mother he has genius ; it will tell ; 
Like murder, it will out ; it will be heard from. 

Mother. It will out at the elbows ; and be heard from the 
poor house, the mad house and the pauper's grave. Genius, 
- v dear, is of mighty little account in this matter-of-fact age. 
Ti-ere was excuse for genius in the days of Shakespeare and 
Byron : not that even they made anybody better or happier : 
but people were not then totally absorbed in the rotine of fash- 
ion and money-making ; and the poets served to muse the 
wealthy and indolent classes. We have had quite enough of 
ius. Genius brings no advantages to its possessor, and 
very little to the world : and as a rule, it is so provoking! v al- 
io poverty that genteel folks should shun it as a pestilence. 



There is nothing, my dear, that can bring us true happi 
but wealth and social position. 

. Well, Mother have your way ; I am resigned, 
You shall not live to say I let you want, 
"When I could buy you bread ; but my poor heart 
Is with the spring time buds, not with the leaves 
Of sere and bleak November. farewell ! 
I yield my all to destiny and will, 
Take fortune as it comes ; what is to be 
Will be ; come anything ; now I am wax, 
The merest child can mould me. 

Mother. Really, child, I see nothing to invite despondency, 
The cards of fortune are running in your favor. 

Irene. I will lend you my fortune, mother ; if 
You'll take the fat man with his money bags, 
I tender them to you. 

Mother. He is an epicure, my child. He will diet upon 
spring chickens. But I must away and see that the house is 
put in order for his reception. [Exit Mother. 

Irene. And this it is to be a woman ; this 
Is money's power to purchase ; I am sold ; 
Sold to the highest bidder, like a slave, 
For uses worser and more loathed to me, 
Than e'er were stripes and drudgery to the slave 
tfn slavery's palmiest hour. A boy could not 
Be sold so like a horse to bear up such a hulk. 
curse of sex ! why were not I a boy, 
That I might tease the pretty girls nor mate 
Y» 7 ith rheumatis and wrinkles, gout and age 
Due at the grave yard any day 'n the week ! 
My sexuality is merchandize ; 
That with my beauty is my stock in trade ; 
And I must sell it for an hour, a night, 
Or for a life time. I have brought enough : 
The gossips will declare I am well sold; 
For there is not a tongue in all the land 
But it will wag and say : she sold herself: 
She is well sold: he is too good for her ; 
It was his money, not himself she married; 
If he should cut her off without a cent 
He'd serve her right, the proud and heartless flirt, 
V> T ho by her arts won the poor weak old man ! 
Thus will they scan me. But this is a play, 
Myself am the chief actor ; we shall see 
The end when it arrives; chance will work out 
What destiny has fixed. 

Enter Servant. 
Serv. De crazy young man dat cocks his eye at do moor. 
and talks to his self desires to see de angelic young lady ob de 
house, as he 'spresses it. Lod ! I wish T was dat young man 
crazy as he'is! 



6 

Irene. Show him up. [Exit Servant'. 

Now you sustaining powers, come to my aid ; 
And you sleuth hags that sometime set a smile 
On face of gory murder whilst his steel, 
Moves stealthily to'ard heart of sleeping babe, 
►Slink from your trails of blood and crouch you here ; 
Make stone my heart and stubborn wires my nerves ; 
Bring Satan's grand dam to make glib my tongue ; 
And Judas kisses'for my honeyed lips ; 
Set on my face smooth sanctity's deceit ; 
Make cold my blood and freeze emotion's tide, 
I teach me to dis-semble j help me play 
hypocrite and traitor so adroitly 
: the arch fiend himself shall envy me j 
For I cannot, I dare not tell him truth ; 
And he must leave me thinking me an angel, 
And wake ere long to write me down a devil, 
The cunningest one extant ; for I cannot — 
No, no, I cannot, cannot, tell him all ; 
Hint at it even and face him I cannot : 
Like injury do I to myself and him, 
Ear blear-eyed treason whelms in common ruin 
Betrayer and betrayed. 

EXTER ARGO. 

jo. The spirits that inhabit peaceful homes 
Rest in this house! How fares my love to-day ? 
(Takes both of her hands.) 

Irene. I am well and yet am ill. How is't with you ?' 

Argo. Quite well in body, but depressed in mind. 
I have not found a market for my wares, 
And now begin to think them valueless ; 
My plays and poems sleep in manuscript, 
For lack of name to give them currency, 
Or gold to buy the critic. Art thou ill ? 

Irene. I was ; but now that you are here with me, 
There's healing in the air, and I am well ; 
I wish you could remain a hundred years. 

Arc/o. I wish I could, and when I win a name 
Or any little fortune I will bring it 
And give it all thee. 

Irene. Live coals of fire ! (Aside.) 

These words are cruel, Argo, and denote 
The presence of the mystic messenger, 
That sometimes gi^es the soul presentiment, 
Of viewless evils hedging it about. 
The mewling calf from teeming udder torn, 
Uplifts its frighted voice as if it saw 
In vacant air the gleaming butcher knives, 
"Whet thin and sharp to shed its little blood. 

Argo. I would not say a cruel worM to thee. 

:?. Words fraught with love and kindness are at times 



More murderous than the bitterest words of hate : 
.You wound but know not why. 

A: ■■ Then let me know it. 

le. The powers that shape events do- write in ridd 
And signal us in omens and in dreams. 
And say in circumstance thought accidental 
A sermon every hour. Our minds are woven 
From threads pervading space in ail directions, 
And interlaced, like webs of cunning spider, 
With every substance having shape or motion ; 
£o any danger or disturbing force, 
That moves towards us agaitates the mesh, 

[ sends us trills of warning, could we read them. 
Do you believo in dreams ? 

Arr/o. No, nor in omens ; 

Nor old women's signs ; but yet I'd rather 
Look first on the new moon o'er my right shoulder, 
As 'twere by accident, and not through brush ; 
There's nothing in it, but I have a preferance, 
And when I miss my choice I look for trouble. 
My first glimpse at the new moon yesternight, 
Was purely accidental and was through 
The funeral branches of a weeping willow. 
Pray do x> ot smile, but this slight circumstance, 
Doth weigh upon me like an incubus, 
Filling me with forebodings of some trouble 
Of more than common blight. 

Irene. Then you will not be taken by surprise, 
Though shots may come from quarters least suspect 
Of harboring hidden foes. Had I the right 
I would be with you and shield you from danger 
In these my loving arms. Pride makes us slaves, 
And drives us from the flowery fields of summer, 
To starve in deserts and in discontent. 

Argo. Thou art a woman — say what we should do ; 
A woman's instinct is worth more than proofs, 
Though sworn in open court. 

Irene. We should have married 

And sought our fortunes after, 

Argo. No, not I : 

Though thou art prescious as the sense of sight, 
I will prepare a cage to hold my bird 
Before I trap the bird. And more than this : 
There is no person worthy such a being ; 
Thou art so delicate in all thy tastes ; 
So pure of thought, so winning in thy ways ; 
So strangely facinating are thy smiles; 
And so bewildering are the thousand graces 
That tongue cannot describe, that it were sin 
.To blast thy bloom with marital debauch. 
'Ti a . ko£ that I would marry thee, Irene ; 



8 

I would not smelt the coarse refuse that forms 

This uncouth, graceless, piece of mechanism, 

With the fine essenses that enter in 

The precious compound of thy perfect person, 

0, no, I would not join this frame of mine, 

Composed of boils, carbuncles and corruption, 

To the fine, incorruptible qualities, 

That form the person of my sweet Irene. 

I'm but a man — thou art an angel pure, 

Bright as the stars, fair as a May-day morn — 

Canst thou be mortal? — thou must hail from heaven, 

For every element that enters into thee, 

Is the quintessence of divinity. 

Hence it were incongruity too gross 

For us to wed. 

Yet thou must wed no other ! 
I fain would have thee by my side forever, 
Ay, even would wed and keep thee but to look at, 
Regarding thee a piece of ware too fine 
For mortal uses or even to be seen, 
Save on some holiday or Sabbath morn. 
I fain would be thy sentinel through life, 
And minister to thy daily, hourly wants ; 
And guard thy snowy, untouched, innocence, 
Till heaven should take it back pure as 'twas given. 
If I could multiply myself into 

Ten thousand troops well drilled and well accoutred, 
The whole should form a body-guard for thee. 
This much I'd be thy husband, but no more. 
Let housemaids keep the baser passions cool — 
Let them bear offspring and contort the face, 
Inflate the cheek, roll back the eye and groan, 
And shake the aguey knee in labor's throes ! • 
Such pangs become not angels, and if thou 
Art not an angel there are none in heaven. 
To some lone island in the vasty deep, 
Far, far, away, in some soft southern clime, 
Where the vile hoof of the vile humbug, man, 
Its hated impress never yet hath made — 
Where every breath of air that fans the cheek, 
Is laden with perfume and balm of life— 
Where the great luminary of the world 
2sVer hides himself — and where bright groves and flowers^ 
Do bloom eternal— where wild roes do feed — 
Where rich fruits ripen and sweet birds do sing, 
There would I bear thee on love's eager wing ; 
There would I place thee in a house whose walls 
Were made of polished gold or alabaster, 
There would I nurse thee on soft beds of velvet, 
Stuffed with the down from ring-dove's bossom's plucked; 
There would I give thee wines of richest flavor, 



And feed thee ever on pure milk and honey ! 

There would I be thy most obsequious slave — 

There would I watch thee through eternal ages, 

Nor compensation ask except the heaven 

Of gazing on thy face. (0 great reward!) 

There would I gloat me on my priceless gem, 

As gloats a miser on his glittering wealth! 

No, no, I would not wed thee, sweet Irene, 

And make of thee a wife like other wives. 

A piece of property to own and usse, 

As one nvay use his horse, and make him trot 

Or rack, or gallop, as may suit his whim — 

And under marriage license to assuage 

The seething fire that riots in the blood, 

By feeding it on otto of thy roses, 

Whence spring the chief infirmities that wait 

On gentle woman's life. No, no, Irene ! 

My love is of a purer, holier cast ; 

'Twould not degrade the object it adores ; 

'Twould bless, not curse; ennoble, not debase; 

''Twould raise*, not sink ; would purify, not pollute.; 

And luster bring, not lust. 

I tell thee, girl, 
If I were sure one particle of lust 
Were lurking in the love I bear for thee ; 
(Which love glow's like a furnace in my soul, 
And doth consume me daily;) 
One base desire, or youthful curiosity ; 
I'd call a doctor, nicely skilled in surgery, 
And have him lay my heart bear, split it neatly, 
And clip a string or two, that hence it might, 
Beat time to holiei music. Still for life, 
If I would have thy sweet companionship, 
We must be smelted in hymenial fire, 
And soldered fast by the firm mode which man, 
(Remarkable for cunning,) has contrived, 
To fuse fond hearts and make two fools but one; 
Oft rendering nature's incompatible, 
Compatible in mockery of dislikes. 
I think thou should' st be an ideal bride, 
And I thy spirit-bridegroom, purified 
From the disgusting grossness in the blood, 
Of the organic creature ruttish man. 
No, not as thoughtless men and women wed; 
Not with the appetites that whet their loyes ; 
Not with the lust that lures them to the sheets, 
(The spur that makes your marrying fools dance up.) 
Will we go to it — but that soul and soul 
May find affinity and fuse as one 
Like globes of quivering mercury. 

Irene, Then will you be my friend forevermore ? 



10 

Argfr. Thy friend ? I'll be thy lover and thy husband,* 
Not only evermore but everylastingly ; 
When I am none of these then I am nothing. 

Irene. Then should my honor ever be assailed, 
As if the gossips should say : She is proud ; 
Or she is fickle ; she is false at heart; 
Would you defend me, Argo? 

Argo. I ! would I ! 

Why I would fight for thee upon the streets ! 
Let any slanderer, show his face to me ! 
I'll disembowel him and feed the dogs, 
Upon his offal right before his face. 

Irene. Then make your name and fortune in a hurr}* ; 
And when you bring them, with your mind unchanged, 
I will accept them and we then will wed. 

Argo. And not till then. Farewell ; the word is said. 

[Exit Argo, 

Irene. woe is me ! earth, crack open here, 
To the deep down and dingiest pit of hell," 
And thence unleash its suffocating fogs 
To choke me where I stand. My light is out ; 
Come dismal midnight with your inkiest pall, 
And hide me from myself. That I must play 
So base a part as this ! That I must lose 
A man so like a god ; that I must take 
A man so like — 0, heart, why break you not ! — 
"And not till then. Farewell ; the word is said" 
These words will haunt me to my inner coffin ; 
It can't be otherwise than I'm a devil ; 
A fury, a she devil; none but a devil 
Could act the devil with such devilish art. 
I am afraid to stand here by myself: 
The devil must be within ten inches of nie ! 
I did invoke his hags : they must be here ; 
5 Tis they that stay my nails from tearing out 
My false, deceitful heart, and throwing it 
To the nearest dog i' the street. I am evil all. 
While Argo is all goodness; his pure thoughts 
Go forth for virtues as the honey bees, 
Go forth for early flowers; while mine — why, mine 
Dive down to bell, down to the murkiest hell, 
I'o fish up falsehoods and blackfaced deceit. 

SCENE II, the same. Irene seated. Enter Servant. 

Serv. De man ob de ponderous abdomen is at de doah belov * 
and : desires to be intwojueed into de presence cb Miss Irene, 
'mejitly. 

Irene. Say to him that I am not at home, 

Serv. But you is ! 

Irene. What's that to you? Tell him I am not dressed t 
receive company. I am ilk I am in bed. Tell him to cah 
to-morrow. 



11 

10k a heah> Miss ; I professes to be a gemmen of 
honah, if I is culled. Do rules ob good 'siety for ..men 

to pack -. ' ile proposition. Wid all due 'spect fob 

I my ckal, I declines, to convey any coinmun- 
nication 'ceo: it be de brufF. . 'Sense me, 

(JEntsr Magoon, overturning /-'• •fright.) 

Pardon my abruptness, Miss Irene. Lord bless 

you, I could.' - another moment's suspense. Why, 

1 my soul, you've grown into a downright beauty. I shall. 

an on this globe. I shall be envied by the 

male population of the entire universe, for I will travel the 

world over to exhibit you and proclaim my felicity. 

ne. Have you been well, major? 

Maj. Never be iter ; I have starved more doctors than 
any man of my age. I have' no faith in them, and therefore 
I'm alive and well. By the way Caunk, I have just seen your' 
mother, and settled all matters to her satisfaction. I have al- 
so made a will, matrimony is a risky business, and we 
are." o die. You heir my entire property, with the 
exception in favor of your mother, if I die while we are arnica- 
Together as husband and wife. Here are the papers, prop- 
erly attested. I deliver them into your hands for safe keep- 
ing. This match saves some of the grandest scoundrels in the 
world from merited vengeance, I was going to will my entire 
wealth to endow a society for the detection and punishment of 
the villainous adulterers of liquors, by which so many of 
us jolly your. - are cut off in our prime. And now, 
when shall the wedding take place? I intend that it shall be 
the event of the season. I have lived 59 years without a wife. 
That's long en< 

Irene. Fix the day yourself, major. I am taking no part 
in this transaction. »I am passive. I am in the hands of Fate. 
I am as a blasted leaf in spring time, blown about my whirl- 
winds. Nothing shall I promote: nothing resist. I shall float 
with the till?. Love you I do not, major: respect you I 
must, for you are good and kind. But I will be dutiful and 
obedient. 

Maj. 0, you will fall in love with me, Pet. There's 
time enough for that. Only be cheerful. Don't go to griev- 
ing. Don' - : be melancholy^ I can't bear to see you despon- 
dent. Gheer up, Pet, and name the wedding day, (Pats and 
kisses her.) and let us be merry and gay. Kow this love does 
run a man's ideas into poetry ! 

Irene. X will try to be cheerful : and as to the wedding- 
day, to-day, to-morrow, any day will do as well as another. 

Maj. JLJless you, my sweet jewel ! It shall be to-morrow, 
and we will have a grand banquet and ball at night. 

Irene. I shall be in reddiness. Here comes my mother. I 
will retire. Perhaps she would like private conference with 
you. . [Exit Irene. 

Mother. Tv r ell, major j how do you find my daughter dispos- 



12 

posed toward you ? She has been reading poetry and culti- 
vating romantic ideas, of late, and I feared the effect upon 
her mind. 

Maj. She's all right, madam. Whole affair arranged. 
Marry to-morrow. Doesn't love me, but a young girl's love 
is light as her smiles. Give a young girl plenty of dress and 
finery and she will be happy. A fig for love; it can be 
cultivated at leisure. I can plant it and raise it like a cab- 
bage. 

Mother. The disparity in your ages, major, is great, and 
the world is accustomed to frown upon marriages of this kind, 
though I think them eminently proper. 

Maj. So do I. The world, as it is called, isn't always 
right. Wouldn't it be absurd to join two snow -balls in the 
hope of generating heat ? Let the icles of age be thawed in 
the furnace of youth. What is the use of adding more fire to 
fire ? Youth is too hot ; age too cold ; fuse them and you have 
a healthful thermometer. Let heat be diffused that coldness 
may be overcome and life and pleasure be prolonged- What 
would two cold lumps, such as you and I, do together? 

Mother. Thank you, sir, I am no cold lunijp. I am as 
warm as any woman. 

Maj. I think you will make an admirable mother-in-law. 
But, good morning. The preparations for the wedding must 
be pushed. [Exit. 

Mother. The unwieldy old monster ! to call me a cold lump ! 
I'll make it hot enough for him ! Why, I was offered mar- 
riage a week ago by a handsome young man of twenty-foEr, 
with a comfortable income. Cold lump ! indeed ! So soon as 
it is known that I have a competency in my own right I will 
not be regarded as cold nor old neither. I will get a husband 
that can call him grandfather. Cold lump! 



ACT II. 

SCENE 7. A bed room. Magoon in bed groaning. Present : 

Irene, Mother, Two old women nurses, Servant and Friends. 

Enter. Dr. Spanker, 

( With surgical instruments and appliances, whicli he hastily 
spreads on a table.) 

Dr. Spanker. What's the matter? Who's sick? male or 
female ? Obstetrics? No. Hernia? or stone in the bladder,? 

Irene- 0, doctor, what do want with all those horrid instru- 
ments ? It is medicine the major wants. 

Dr. I always go prepared for any emergency, madam. I 
am glad it is no worse. I expected an operation for hernia or 
an amputation at the least. 

Mother. 0, doctor, be quick ; the major has had a fit, 

Maj* Devil a fit, It is the cramp colic. I had it in "Lon- 

\ 



don. They, soaked me in boiling water and injected me with ' 
a fireman's hose. 0, dear! 0, dear! 

Dr. (To himself.) Depressed pulse ; cold skin ; abused 
stomach ; too much capon ; too much beer. 
Mother. (Aside.) That's what T thought. 
Dr. Did he eat a heavy supper? 

'■■r. I should say he did ! Why ho has vomited four 
gallons. 

Irene. 0, no. mother. 

Maj. Yes I have: I'm as empty as the air. 
Dr. (Writes and hands prescription to Servant.) Go im- 
mediately to the apothecary with this. 

Servant. (Spells out the paper, a little 'way off.) 
R.-e-c-i-p-e. Dat stands foh recete. What dis? H-y- 
d-r-a-r-g. ; yes, hydrarg. dat's calomel. C-h-1-o-r-i-d. M-i-t.: 
Chlorid. Mit. grs. 60.; dat's calomel too. O-I-e-u-m, oleum, 
dat's oil.' T-i-g-1-i-i, trglii ? what de debble can dat be? 
M-i n-i-m-s, minims 6: dat's 5 draps. Eo?_h God ! dat's cro- 
ton oil ) dead shuah to kill. Wid de 'dition ob one pint ob 
terpentine, dis is de 'xact 'scription I used to gib massa's boss 
for de botts- 

Irene.' Why, Sam ! you here yet ? Why don't you hurry ? 
Dr. What has emancipation brought us to ! Such unpar- 
donable indolence! 

Sertant. It has brought you to de knowledge dat de culled 
man is competent to wrestle wid cle great problems ob life. 
Indolence, to be shuah ! Learning in de culled man is indo- 
lence ! Oho, can't cober up youh calomel in latting from de 
culled man now I [Exit. 

Dr. Apply a blister to the nape of the neck and twent} 7 
leeches to the pit of the stomach. I will call again. [Exit. 

Irene. (To a servant.) Go and bring a leecher and an 
apothecary with a blister. 

Servant. All right, madam. [Exit, 

SCENE II, The same. Present, Irene, Mother, Old Lady and 
Servant. 
Irene. Do you feel easier, major ? 

Maj-. Devil a bit. I'm worse ; ten times worse. My neck 
is on fire ; my belly is bleeding, and my Very bowels have been 
purged away : and yet no ease. Give me some hot punch. 0, 
dear ! Hasn't Spanker come ? Toddy, toddy ! 

Xo, my dear major. The poor man is almost with- 
out hope. 

Maj. He is, eh ? Sand for another doctor; I want no 
hopeless doctors about me. Toddy, toddy ! 

Mother, Pray, major, shall I call my family physician ? 
Maj. Call anybody ; a horse farrier can't do worse than 
Spanker. Give me the toddy ! 

Mother. (To Servant.) Go for Dr. Smick. (Gives the toddy.) 

Serva it. I hab a poah 'pinion ob dis Smick. His pills isn't 

bigger dan heads ob pins. Dey.will nebber mobe dat worrum • 



14 

from de major. I is satisfied now dat it be a case ub tape 
worrum, shuah. 

Irene. Never mind, Sam what it is. Go and bring Doctor 
Smiek. [Exit Servant. 

Maj Bring me some more toddy. My bowels are tied in 
bard knots. Toddy ! toddy ! 

1st Old Lady. Have a little of this pepper tea, major. 

2nd Old Lady. Major, I have some water and flour teemed 
together. It never fails to break the colic. If you could only 
drink a quart of it. 

Maj, Give them to me. Give me anything: give me the 
toddy, the toddy, the toddy, the toddy ! (Drinks.) 

Enter Dr. Smick. 
0, doctor, I am about seven-tenths dead. 

Dr. I see. You have had Spanker with his heroic treat- 
ment. Well, if people will be killed with blisters and calo- 
mel it is their own business. (Examines Magoon.) Nervous 
exhaustion ; a clear case. (Prepares some powders at a side 
table.) Give him one of these powders every five minutes, in 
ten drops of beef tea. Nothing else ; positively nothing else 
must go down his throat. ' [Exit, 

Irene. Here, major, take one of the powders. 

Maj, You have spilled it. There's nothing in the spoon. 

Irene. It is the dote the doctor ordered. You are to take 
one such dose every live minutes. 

Maj, I am, eh ! Well, now mix all at once and I will take 
every one in one minute, and swallow the quack if he comes 
(back here. There now. 0, my bowels I Give me a little sup 
of toddy. 

Mother, (Aside.) He's worse. His mind wanders. 

1st Old Lady. Ladies, I would call the colored doctor, doc- 
tor Abram Turner. I heard of his bringing a worm forty 
yards long from a man who was suffering just like the major is. 
He always doctors for worms. 

Mother. Do you mean the colored blacksmith? 

1st Old Lady. Well, he was a blacksmith, and then a horse 
doctor, but he is now doing a regular practice. It is time we 
lay aside our prejudice against color. Relief is what the ma-, 
jor wants. 

Maj* 0, 3 T es : that's what I want. Send for him. He shod 
my horses a year ago. Toddy, toddy ! 

Irene. Go for doctor Abram Turner forthwith. 

Servant. Now I begins to sea lite. De major hab a slim 
chance ob rccobery yet. Culled pussens to de front ! 

Maj. 0, Lord! give me a little more of that toddy. I am 
about gone : toddy ! toddy ! beer ! 

Enter Doctor Turner. 

Turner. Majaii., is you ifff sah ! Let me 'znmmir. dis belly 
onct. (Examines) Worrum dar. Worrum hab gone ingane, 
or he hab fits. C&n feel him rippin de broad ligaments. He is 
coiled about do iopiaii tubes ob de ascendin cavy, cuttin off do 



15 

blood frona de front sinus ob do quadratus lumboruin ; and at di. 
same time his head is stickin fast in de eliol} r ductus docus fob 
shuab . closiii dat 'portant tuberosity and deprivin de left venta" 
hie ob de heart ob its natral supply ob bile. Dis monster is what 
we doctahs calls oxhurus ascaris, alluddin to Judas Isearret, de 
fust to liab him; and dat'a why Judas betray ed^ Jesus de Jew. 
He be known to hab hydrofoby and fits. You liab only one 
ob him at a time. I will pass him or pacify him. Make 
dese roots into a quart ob tea and gib it to de niajah 
berry hot and fast. [Exit 

Maj. (Picking at the air.) I see gnats. Brush them 
awa} r ; a little more toddy ; toddy ; toddy ! 

Mother. (Fanning him.) He is failing, poor man. 
Maj, Where is my Irene ? WJiere is my bride ? 
Irene, Here I am, my dear major. What can I do for 
you? 

Maj. Nothing, nothing; give me some toddy; the doctors 
1 don't understand my case. 

En teh, Tubes. 
Tubbs. What ! may the devil take me, is the major sick ? 
Why, major, how do you do ? 
Maj. 0, Tubbs, is it you ? 

Tubbs. May the devil boil me for an owl if it ain't. 
Maj. Yes, Tubbs, I'm sick, sick, sick! Let me. have 
some toddy. 

Tubbs. Have you been a takin o' this doctor stuff? If 
you have, don't you take another bit, may I be damned, but 
it'll kill you. 

Irene. We liave tried all the doctors, and he is getting 
weaker. Poor, poor man. 
Tubbs. Calomy doctors ? 

Irene. Yes, he has had calomel and jalap and croton oil. 
He has taken everything. 

Tubbs. May I be damned, but the calomy '11 kill him. 
|As for me and mine, we never take doctor stuff; but if 1 
must have a doctor give me a steam doctor or give me no 
doctor at all. Now do you send nncl get the old man Slabbs ; 
he's an old steam doctor and a man that knows a heap. 
He'll gather a yarb that grows fernenst his barn: he'll bile 
it down and make it into a tea, and give it to you : and if 
the pane's not in the bones but under and fernenst the ribs, 
it'll cure you in an hour; but if the pane's in the bones, 
its the calomy, and may I be damned, but it'll kill you. 

Maj. Well, send for old man Slabbs; I know him w T ell ; 
* he is mainly in the hoop-pole business. Give me some 
toddy. (Irene gives it to him.) 

Tubbs. So he is major, but he's a mighty knowin' man. 



16 

These calomy doctors ! may I be damned, but they ought to 
be in the penetentiary. I'll fetch Slabbs myself. (Exit. 

SCENE III. A Street Enter Colored Servant. 

De berry debble is to pay. Heah is a chance foh doctah 
Abram Turner to J stinguish hisself, and dey keeps heavin 
in Je medicines dat works agin de doctah's tea, and makes 
de worrum madder and madder, wid out killin him. De 
fool Tubbs hab gone foh de erb doctah, and I is commanded 
to watch de street foh doctah Slash, whom it is de inwarri- 
ble rule to call when it is dun shuah dat de patient will 
die anyhow. 

Enter Dr. Slash. 

Ah, doctah I you is wanted at de bed side ob majah Ma- 
goon. He married last night and he will die to-day; dare- 
foh dey wants you. 

Dr. Slash. What ails your master ? 

Servant. Massa ! I has no massa, sah ! I is a gemmen 
sah, if I is culled. I mobes in good 'sciety. 

Slash*. Ton do eh? Well, now let me see you move! 
(Kicking him out.) 

SCENE IV. The bed room. 

Enter Tubbs and Slabbs. 

Tubbs, Here's a man, Mr. Slabbs, that's been a takin 
o' calomy and other doctor stuff, and may I be damned, but 
its a killin of him. Blow me. but I'd give him lobely and 
get it all outen him, as quick as the devil 'ud let me. 

Sla')bs. That's the first thing to be done. Here major, 
down with this or you are a dead man. (Major swallows it 
and immediately begins straining to vomit.) 

Tubbs. Gentlemen, he's bad. Lobely 's not a goin 7 to 
cure that man. I'd recommend you to send for doctor 
Slash. He's an old calomy doctor that makes a sure shot — 
invariably kills, because he's never sent for till the patient 
has the death rattle. If he could get a sight at a man only 
hall dead he'd save him. Why, here he comes. 
Enter Dr. Slash. 

Slash. Why, what is the matter? Major, rouse up here. 
"What's the matter? How do you do? How do you feel? 

Tubbs. May I be darned, but he feels like a man that's 
been a takin' calomy till he's about dead. (Slash gives 
him a look, and gets one with interest back.) 

Slash. Have you had the doctors here? 

Irene. 0, yes, doctor, all of them and he seems to get no 
ease; 



17 

Slash. There i3 need of promptness. (Mixes and gives 
him a dose.) Now give him plenty of, hot whisky. 

Tubbs. May I be damned, but it'Vmbre calomy. (Aside to 
Slabbs.) That man i3 dead. Salt won't save him. 

Maj. (Faintly.) Yes, give me the whisky. That's my 
medicine. Toddy, toddy, hot toddy I I'm freezing. 

Tubbs. You are right, major. Whisky is a good medicine. 
If it won't save you nothing will. (Magoon gasps. Irene 
takes his hand.) May I be damned, but the major's dead 
The calomy's killed him. 

ACT III. 

SCENE I, A Gloomy Wood. 
Enter ABGO with a revolver, a dagger and a vial of poison. 
Argo, It sometimes happens that a man must die 
To prove himself a man ; and evils come '- 
In shapes that cannot be endured ; and death 
Is sought by way of refuge, or to wring, 
Some heart where ours is shrined. To yield the flesU 
To putrefactive forces and to worms. 
And leave the curious bones, the pretty joints 
To wear and waste to native salts and earth ; 
Or else mayhap to be strung up on wires, 
In some quack's shop to frighten timid maid3, 
And draw from fools much idiotic question ; 
Or to be hid in the quack's private cell, 
Where he receives his mistress on the sly, 
And there stand grinning at adulterous feats 
Bead to the rapturous sport ; or else to creep 
Away down through the years to natural death, 
Without the charm which could have made the journey 
Endurable at least ; and ever conscious 
Of the nine times detestable outrage 
Played off upon me ; and to know that he-— 
hell ! let me forget it ! — he enjoys 
My wife ! for she is mine ! earth's laws and heaven's 
Have nothing that to love's hot oaths can add 
A tithe more marrying power. — Divorced and cuckold !— 
Horn'd, fork'd, spik'd, spit on ! — suieide must purge 
This foul disgrace away. And yet to die, 
To die, to leave the green earth and to yield 
One's whole prerogatives to other men, 
Is hard. To leave one's books, one's horses, dogs, 
Houses and lands, and money if one has it- 
All those conveniences one hag contrived 
And those arrangements one has just completed 
To minister to ease, is hard ; and harder, 
Is't not to know who'll be elected Tuesday ; 
What war3 may rage in the next twenty years ; 
What little men loom up j wkat great men fall j 



18 

What women be seduced, what wives divorced 5 

Who'll win the horse race that comes off next week j 

And there's no telegraph nor daily press 

In the unknown abyss. 

the extremity is dire indeed 

That makes the young seek death ; oblivious death s 

Annihilation : man prefers to wear 

His faculties clear out, and crawl t* his grave, 

Inch at a time, snail like, until he chokes 

From failure of the emunctories to bear off 

The incidental poisonous compounds 

That in life's chemical workshops accrue, 

In the processes f nd occult assays, 

Whose grand achievement is the crimson tide t 

Which is the food of life. We fight for breath, 

Till the worn lungs no longer generate 

Electric heat to vitalize the blood, 

Which now coagulate and cold, clogs up 

The avenues of life ; and then our elementg 

Seek out their kindred elements ; and each 

Finds its affinity, and all disperse — 

But not to perish ; all will re-appear, 

In different combinations — in the air, 

The earth, the ocean, other animals, 

In fruits, in flowers, in leaves, offensive gas*e* 

Or in the damask cheek of beauty. But 

Atoms to dissolution given, never 

Can be combined more. So a hereafter, 

Embodying shape, remembrance, retrospect, 

Or sense of pain or pleasure is impossible* 

As the iinpossiblest thing in nature. We 

Might just as reasonably essay to find 

The myriad rain-drops falling in the sea, 

And hope to recognize some special drop, 

As hope to recognize in the hereafter, 

A face familiar here. Well, what of this ? 

Suppose 'twere otherwise ? should that deter u«? 

From self destruction? Some there are who argue 

That only the insane destroy themselves. 

Am I insane, who reason me and plead 

Like an attorney after the verdict's in ?. 

Jlad men are rash and brave. Have I a doubt 

That death is all and there is nothing after, 

That I fro to't with argument ? — no, no ; 

But I've no time to die by slow process, 

Nor to stand spinning out mere speculation ; 

I must die now ; must die in twenty minutes ! 

I would not live to be laughed at to-morrow 

For forty thousand dollars in my hand I 

There is no remedy but death for him 

Who has been jilted by a heartless beauty, 



19 

To whom he's turned his fool soul wrong side out ! 
The blackest fiends of hell did never practice 
A trick so sure to cut a proud man off. 
Let hell make room — a man so cut, so cuckold, 
Hath country only there. The chamber maids, 
The very boot blacks knew Irene was mine ! 
The pea-nut venders, apple-women — all 
Knew us amnaced up to the very night 
When her consuming heat assuaged a boar ! 
I'm laughed at by the raggedest boy 'n the street ! 
I'd die for this if hell had nothing hotter ! 
Now come grim murder with your goriest hand I 
One sweep of this keen dagger cuts my throat, 
And ends the matter quickly ; still I am 
^Opposed to all barbarity in killing. 
I never stoned a bird nor drown'd a kitten, 
1 who want my own blood have shed no blood ! 
But I am shaken with my bloody purpose, 
And with my trembling hand may botch the job, 
And being discovered wallowing in my gore, 
• Be set upon by surgeons and be saved 
To my intense disgust. I cannot stab ; 
Fire arms are best— a bullet through the brain 
Doth pass like lightening and is scarcely felt ; 
And there's small chance of failure — 'tis less brutal 
To spring a trigger than to cut a gash ; 
Still it may snap or my unsteady aim 
Cause worser havoc than a half cut throat. 
Perhaps 'twere better to engulph this poison — 
'Twill kill without a pang, you sleep to death, 
And never know the moment you depart. 
Yet I'm no judge of drugs and may have looked 
So like a kill-sheep dog when ordering this, 
That the pert pill-box nosing out my purpose, 
Being wise as new fledged quacks perforce mu3t b«, 
Brewed me an anodyne or vile emetic, 
Instead of the life-suffocating chloral 
To give me riddance ; and even now perhaps, 
He dogs me here to witness the result ; 
Thinking to laugh while I do heave and vomit, 
Or else to lull my wronged, indignant spirit 
In a composing sleep — thus cheating me 
Into some hours of life, and thwarting roe 
In my most fixed and settled purpose — thus 
By a foul swindle, making me appear 
Thrice more ridiculous than I am already t 
I will not touch it. But what will I do ? 
I will not live, yet scarcely dare to die ; 
I'll plunge this dagger to the spinal marrow 
And end £he parley straight ! But not too fast ; 
I may not make a decent looking corpse, 



20 

knd when the'coroner's rag'muffin jury 
Come to inspect me, they may scoff or jeer, 
Or pass some" jest that should not go unpunished,. 
And show the body of a bashful man 
rStark naked to a mob of gaping fools, 
Of after incidents the most abhorrent 
To all the senses- Is there no escape ? 
But for the coroner's jury I could do it. 
Let me consider cooly — must I die ? 
J)ie for a woman ? Are there not concealed, 
In earth or hell some direr helps to vengeance ! 
By lining grimly on through all my years, 
And hating all the women all the ti*ne — 
Doing to them every unkind, ugly thing- 
Writing against them — preaching against them — 
Backbiting them — making faces at thein— 
Pinching their babies — making their husbands jealous 
Slandering them, (if it were possible) — 
Seducing them, (if it would plague them any)— 
By these means might I not spite them a little. 
And feed my vengeance some?. 
I'll try it for a time, though I may reap, 
Less vengeance than vexation. 
I trust no eye hath seen me ; I'm ashamed 
Of my irresolution — it is fear, 
Or I would else be fly-biown and the buzzards 
Be here at conference. Irene, Irene I 
To what extremity I've come for thee ! 
Where is the precious estimate of woman 
I had but yestermorn ! At dead of night 
While my muse ranged the universe for flowery 
And rainbow tints and rubies to adorn 
The coronet 'twas weaving for thy brow : 
Even then thou wert locked in conjugal clutch 
With a worn lecher I and myself, greenhorn — 
I, duped idiot, was contorting rhymes 
. To sound thy virtues ! Fie ! But I am cured 
To thft thoracic duct. 
A careful estimate of woman's faults 
Would shock the devil ; we see not her faults, 
We're blind to everything except the toy 
She keeps to tantalize us ; but for that 
She'd get her dues from bards and other writers 
Whose flattery is measured by their lusts. 
I see her as she is, and being impartial, 
Say she is treacherous, vain, deceitful, giv'n to lying :?. 
To eating clay and gum ; slate pencils, chalk; 
She has hysteria by the year — the yellow jaundice, 
Bispepsia and chlorosis ; polypus ; 
With lead marks under the eyes — these half the time ;- 
False teeth, a tapeworm, corns — infallibly these. 



21 

£fce most delights in dress, balls, fooling mea. 
And being fooled ; for there is brwdry in 
Her bones, her blood, in each particular drop. 
These are a few of her most marked defects, 
But there is not a trouble known to mortals 
But she's at bottom of it. 1" do hate her, 
-And am well rid of her. 

SCENE II. A room. Irene in mourning,, 
Irene. Occasions make the actors they require, 
And great emergencies sometimes bring forth 
immense resource, and develop strength 
In individuals or in nations whence 
We looked for weakness only : will is power: 
My purposes are great and I ;im strong. 
They take me for a vain and idle woman, 
A slave to fashion and to avarice,* # 

And think that a3 I have come into fortune, 
I will come out a flauating butterfly • 
But I will fill their ears with other stories * 
I'll show them that a woman's head is full, 
Of plots and strategies, and that her heart when swoll'r. 
With love or hate can dare death, hell, the furies ! 
I'll have him back— I will lose all or have' him. 
I did obey my mother as in duty, 
For who can tell what mothers bear for children I 
What pains, what care3, what sleepless nights and days., 
Must the poor mother bear to rear her b*aby ! 
Which, when grown up, too often makes return 
In disobedience and ingratitude. 
I sold myself and broke my vows to buy 
Some little comforts for my failing mother; 
As she when I was little would have sold 
Her dearest treasures to procure me food. 
An4now as heaven has taken away my husband, 
And left me that which he could not take with him ; 
And as my mother is provided for, 
And I have leisure for some further business, 
I will put on the stage another play, 
And win fresh laurels or throw all away, 

Enter Lawyer and Notary, with legal paper*. 
£aw>. Good morning, good lady. You are looking well 
Weeds become you mightily. 
Irene. Have you drawn the papers as I directed ? 
Law. They are ready for your signature. (Irene reads 

tay ot your confidence. 

Not. He is a fortunate young man. 

Irene. Please keep the matter private until yeu hear furth- 
S«£?. me f' > T iS * ? ertificate of d *P°sit with written dir- 
MA out dlSp08lti0n > wMch X m « sfc * } »° W you to m 



22 

Both. We will obey you, madam. Farewell. [Exit, 

Irene. How many sickly doubts and fears assail us, 
If we make pause to listen to their tongues, 
While we are lugging lame irresolution 
To the front door of action : after all 
How easy is performance when the mind 
Is well resolved and settled in its purpose. 
Now for another chapter. 

SCENE III. A studio. Publisher and Critic. 

Pub. We have lost on that volume of the crazy fellow 
Argo, have we not? 

Critic. It may turn out so. The fellow has genius, but ho 
is imprudent. He makes reckless assaults upon the vices, be- 
liefs and prejudices of men and women ; and people won't pay 
money to be told of their follies and absurdities. 

Pub. Have you examined his last production? 

Critic. I have looked it through. It has merit. If the 
fellow had a name to give it a start it would have a good run. 

Pub. Perhaps ; but we can't help unknown authors into 
prominence. We must deal with those who are already fa- 
mous. I have written declining his book. 

Enter Notary and Lawyer. 

Pub. Ay, gentlemen : glad to see you ; be seated. 

Law. We called on a little business. Have you in press a 
book by the young fellow Argo ? 

Pub. The work was offered, but we have declined it. 

law. Has it merit? 

Pub. That is not the question. There is no money in it. 
The author is too little known. 

Law. Perhaps money would buy him into notice. 

Critic. It would ; merit without money is powerless. 

Law. A party that must be unknown in the affair, desire* 
vou to advance to the author, as from yourself, ten thousand 
dollars on his book. Here is a check for that sum. 

Pub. That is liberal. We will attend to the matter. 

\Exit Lawyer and Notary. 
We must seek out the crack brain. This money will bring 
him to the surface. 

Critic. His work is excellent. I have known that all the 
time. We will undertake him now that he has heavy backing. 

SCENE IV. A studio. Argo reading a letter ; tears it and 
rises. 

Argo Why should I struggle longer ? I am done. 
A further effort to be great or good, 
In view of tuese rebuffs would be unmanly ; 
Occasions rise when villainy is virtue. 
And when you may employ the devil's weapon* 
To fight his armies off. When one is in 
A war with villains he must be a villain. 
M&fi is the villain waging war on me,. 



23 

T r>nt average man, is every inch a villain ; 

Nine-tenths of every ounce of him are villain, 

And the other tenth is tyrant. Damn him ! 

I wish the devil had giv'n me other shape. 

It. is notorious that no man is true 

To ought except himself; riay, not t' himself; 

He'd rather walk barefoot to hell, being rascal, 

Than being half honest, ride to heaven on springs. 

Cheated by men, I never trusted woman 

Who did not put herself to extra trouble 

To craze my soul with love but to betray it. 

Are ail like these? or does some crooked chance 

Present me ever the worst specimens 

Of women and of men ? It must be fate, 

Fixed by the adverse stars when I was born. 

There was a time when I did seek for fame, 

For honor and distinction in the world , 

Long did I struggle in the mad pursuit, 

But fate did thwart me so I caught chem not, 

And now the chase is ended. All my arrows 

Are shot awry ; and my most cherished hopes 

Lay limp and withered like to early corn 

Nipped by untimely frost. That man's a slave 

Who has a cherished hope or aspiration, 

And who has none is free ; now having none, 

I'm free, and will give nature rein ; and like 

A baulky racer able to win the race, 

I'll only rear and plunge. I will become 

A misanthrope with hate so hot that it 

Shall make my eyeballs vomit fire and fix, 

Upon my brow a scowl to shed the plague ; 

Set my firm jaws and make my aspect such 

That men who «ee me bolt as from the devil, 

And grazing herds stampede, though I approach 

No nearer than a mile. I'll move wi' th' plague 

At dead of night and strew the earth with graves, 

I'll shake men like an earthquake—swoop them up 

Like a tornado or a hot simoom. 

I'll work upon their passions with my pen, 

I'll make wild havoc in the social circles, 

By hell invented stories that shall point 

To infidelities crossed forty ways; 

Backed up by circumstance so probable 

That wives shall lose all faith in husbands ; busbars d* 

In wives ; mothers in daughters, and daughters 

Believe their mothers bawds ; when all may b« 

As innocent as babes. 

My chiefest study shall be men's designs, 

And when I fathom their complots and plans, 

And find from whence each draws his chiefest bli§s, 

Then, with red vengeance reveling in my brain, 



24 

I'll lay my little plans and counterplots , 
And subtle schemes to trip them. This I'll do- 
Ay, fifty other fell, malicious things, 
A million other foul malpractices ; 
(Which, like a merchant, counting up his means, 
I will enumerate and classify,) 
Will I employ to vex and worry men. 

So much for them, — and now%or.womea— ! 
Bring me a chisel and a mallet, quick i 
That I may pummel off these amorous bumps,, 
The bane of all my life ! woman, woman I 
Thy loadstone doih attract me and repel ! — 
Now I adore thee, now I loathe thy name ; 
To-day I worship, but to-morrow weep ! 
Thou shouldst be faithfulr>]but I find thee false. 
Sweet source of all my hopes, haps and mishaps, 
I cannot live with thee, I die' without thee ; 
Like a wrecked seaman, famishing from thirst, 
Which he attempts to 'swage with briny drops, 
And thirstier grows with drinking ! — thou art 
The wide Atlantic which my thirsty soul 
Is cast away upon — it needs must drink; 
For drinking not, it famishes to death, 
And drinking, dies for drink. Thou lov'st me not, 
Tho' with a Pagan's mad idolatry, 
Have I pursued thee— 0, thou art my sun, 
My moon, my star, my stumbling block, my steam 
That doth propel me. excelling creature ! 
I had resolved to be a thorough villain, 
But thoughts of thee will shame me from my purpose,, 
How can a man be other than a man 
When woman's observation is upon him ? 
heart of man I a riddle art thou still ; 
Here have I softened to a very lamb 
From the most roaring lion, at the thought 
Of woman, woman, woman ! Why, I should — 
No doubt I should— if the particular woman, 
Even she herself, the falsest and the fairest, 
Who hus deceived me most— I should be slow, 
To do a scaly trick if only she 
Were witness to it, and if I were sure 
She would be struck with death the very instant 
She read me out a villain. 

i Enter Lkrne. 

Irene. He's hero and is alone) now for the worst; 
Though he may stab my heart with cruel speech, (Aeiete, 
The music of his tongue will heal the stabs 
As fast as words can make them. 

[Argo regards her gloomily.] 

Noble youth I 
Turn not away, bat hear my piteous pr&ysr v 



25 

If thou canst not forgife the grevious wrong 

Inflected on thee by a thoughtless girl, 

Whose eye was dazzled by the gilded charm 

That held seductive pictures to the view, 

And lured the giddy brain with shining toys ; 

Vouchsafe to stand whilst I unload the woes 

Whose dreadful weight has bowed my spirit dawn, 

Whilst I have sought thee to deliver them ; 

For they have market only in thine ears, 

And I must be receipted here for them, 

Or bear them where their then too welcome weight, 

May help me find the genii of the deep, 

That live on skulls and dwell in ocean caves. 

Stand there nor stir not, Argo, till thine ears 

Have drunk the mournful tale of my remorse. 

And pity's river, rising in thy soul, 

Deluge thine eyes with sweet forgiving rains 

To wash away my sins. 

Argo. Is this reality ? 

Or hath diseased imagination thrown 
On the distorted mirror m my brain, 
A false creation ? Woman, hast thou life ? 
I either am asleep and in a dream, 
Or else, bereft of reason, stand I here 
Addressing simple speech to vapid air ; 
Or else my senses are in healthful play, 
And thou art Irene, relict of Magoon, 
Whom, of all women, I should least suspect 
Of having sense of wrong, or saltish tears, 
Or conscience to accuse, or heart to love, 
Or soul to ask forgivenness. 

Irene, Say not relict ; 

A wife, a widow, but a maiden still ; 
The old man died of surfeit, in his cups, 
He gormandized and gorged him at the feast 
That followed the unholy nuptial tie, 
(For he was giving to gluttony and drink ;) 
And whilst. I shuddered at my loathed fate, 
A 5 * the bridesmaids disrobed me for my doom, 
And I debated with quick suicide, 
The good man toppled from his easy chair, 
Beset with apoplex or stomach gout. 
Confusion and dismay seized on the guests : 
And I was summoned to my good man's side- 
So were the doctors — and by the disease, 
Or by the science that essayed its cure. 
Or both conjoined, the hidden source of life 
Was reached and sapped ; the intricate machine 
Was clogged and stopped, and the stout heart. 
The bosom's sleepless, throbbing sentinel, 
That pumped the crimson tide with riches lfcd<t&. 



2t> 

f o feed the hungry tissues, eighty years, 
Without a pause till now, stood still at last f 
And sticky dampness, like a heavy dew, 
Btood on the paiid brow, whilst the film'd eye 
i^Iared on vacuity, and the pinched nose, 
Bunk cheek, and grimace horrible to sight, 
Proclaimed the struggle ended. 

Argo. Did you weep ? 

Irene. Not for the dead : I weep for those who live > 
Death is forgetfulness; it is oblivion : 
The end of sufferance ; the end of all. 
But for the things of life are we concerned ; 
There can be nothing after. Thus reflecting, 
Beside the corse, now dead to thought and motion, 
My light frivolities seemed to depart, 
Like troops of capering ninnkies, hiding them 
At the approach of danger; weighty thoughts, 
Came limping lazily athwart my brain, 
And for the first time I began to see 
Myself in niy true colors : in that hour 
I lived a dozen years. I jumped the bounds, 
The flow'ry hedge that keeps the giggling girl, 
From the broad fields of blooming womanhood; 
Changed was- my nature, and one glance within, 
Revealed a soul disfigured by foul stains 
Invisible before; which to expunge 
Hath been my soul employ these many weeks. 
The seeds of error sown in giddy youth, 
Sprout quickly into briars to tear our flesh ; 
And error comes to youth in gay attire, 
With winning smiles and wreathes of early flowers; 
And golden apples in the dimpled hands, 
And troops of fairies chanting merry songs; 
80 in the early morning of our youth 
Reflection is surprised and taken prisoner,- 
The joyful music of the bounding heart, 
Enrapts the judgment in mesmeric sleep, 
And in this mood the fatal march begins 
That leads to ruin. Then repentance comes : 
Comes oft too late, but it is sure to come ; 
For the quick iwinge of conscience will be felt, 
And sobered judgment will direct the heart, 
(If that the heart be great/) how to atone 
For injuries done to others or ourselves 
In youth's capricious hour. And Argo, thus, 
With reason new enthroned and mind matured, 
And heart surcharged with upheaving woes, 
I here obtrude upon thy privacy, 
And ask forgiveness ! Mercy ! mercy ! mercy ! (Kneels. 

Argo. Let the earth rush to the sun in twenty seconds, 
"if I deny thee— if I show not mercy. 



27 

(If any gracious act of mine be mercy.) 

And if 1 do not pour forgiveness out 

As lavish as Niagara's rushing flood 

Pours o'er its craggy brow, to wash away, 

(If that will wash away,) the heavy grief 

That weighs upon the sweetest woman's heart, 

That ever yet did plead to swinish man 

When he should plead to her — fix me here, 

Firm in my tracks, a corpse of solid stone, 

That may withstand the heats and frosts of time,- 

That love sick maidens in all after years, 

May troop them hither and in horror sigh : 

"That stone was once a man whose flinty heart, 

Refused forgiveness to a piteous maid, 

Who, in an evil hour, in tender years, 

And through advice of an ambitious mother, 

Forgot the pledges she had made to him ; 

And, but for fate, which ordered otherwise, 

Would have become another's — then repenting, 

8he came with tears to melt his frozen heart. 

To own her error and to sue for pity ; 

But this denying, the malignant powers, 

Changed him to stone as there you see him stand, 

With visage grim and a forbidding frown 

On his unyielding brow!" Rise ! angel, rise! 

(Irene arises and falls into his arms.") 
All follies of the past, are buried here ; 
I do acquit thee of all blame — 'twas I — 
It was my fault ; 'twas poverty j it was — 
Well, it was anything but fault of thine. 
I should have bent me to thy girlish ways - 
I should have had more gold and less ambition — 
For love itself must compromise with gold, 
And aspirations, noble in their nature, 
And fraught with blessings to ourselves and others., 
Decay before their bloom beneath the frosts 
And chilling blasts of poverty. And Wants, 
the grinning troop of wants that harass life, 
Led by the skinny hag, the Want of Gold, 
Embitter all the hours that else were sweet, 
Seal up promotion, and, like hungry wolvea 
With hydrophobic teeth and gummy eyes, 
Pursue and bay the impecunious wretch, 
And hound him to his hovel, or to hell ; 
For any place on earth is hell to him 
Who has no bank account. 

Irene. And any place, 

Where love is absent is a barren spot, 
And where he is, a heaven. Do you belie?"* 
That love's infatuation may possess us-, 
And. make our lives aa sweet as zephyrs playing 



28 

Amid magnolia groves in southern climes, 

And we net know it? Is there an infection 

So subtle that it steals into our tissues, 

Till it is as it were our very essence, 

And we not know its source, nor feel its presence, 

Till some familiar voice, scarce prized before, 

Is lost in death or distance? I was happy, 

And thought the wealth and station in my reach 

Would gild the hours and make that happiness 

Perennial as the pines. Alas, when lost, 

I found it was my Argo's voice supplied 

The melody that made the gold-fringed moments danee 

Bo merrily away. Then, had the world's whole store 

Of precious metals been my own,- I'd sold them, 

I would have bartered every ounce away, 

If that the shining treasure would have bought me, 

With its delicious sweetness, back again 

One hour of Argo's love. 

Argo. But all that wealth. 

With alt the other treasures superadded, 
Could never buy a husband worthy 
A woman such as this. But may not he 
Who is secure in vast possessions, «peak 
Disparagingly of wealth ? Thou now art rich ; 
And I congratulate thee j But, Irene, 
If I had all the wealth in our inventory, 
And that would buy thee, I would give it for thcxi. 
Or give it to thee. But to me no more 
May come the rainbow-tinted moments, 
The rosebuds and the singing birds of summer, 
The aspirations and the hopes of youth, 
The consciousness and pride of manhood's power, 
The thirst for fame and the applause of men ; 
And the heart's sweeter hopes than ail the rest. 
The yearnings of the soul to win at last, 
The approbation and the eye of woman. 
O all farewell I Life's craggy coast affords 
No shelter, and no gap to let me forth 
To the green fieids beyond. 

Irene, Why, Argo, you're distract. Must I not f*&? 
That you have given color to the rumor 
That somewhere in your brain there is a crack 
Across the healthful structure ? Like the winds 
You list and roar by turns. You cannot take 
The evil with the good, the bitter with the sweet. 
As here in life they are inseperable 
And thus presented to us. There are those 
Who will not take the world in which they move,, 
A little period in their rounds through space* 
As they do find it ; but are ever seeking 
To make it as they fancy it should be, 



29 

And to reverse the fixed laws of nature. 
They would conform all appetites and tastes 
To their own standard. But the level mind 
Takes circumstances in and makes the best, 
Of the combin'd surroundings ; patiently 
It bears with evils unavoidable ; 
And t© the fullest it enjoys the pleasures, 
And sweets within its reach. 

Argo. A woman still ! 

that philosphy is worth to me 

More than was ever preached. Dissatisfaction, 
Impatience, petulence, ye safforn devils ! 
Depart ye hence, and leave me ! 0, Irene I 

1 will reform me ! Make me what you will ; 
Like the glass-blower you can blow me into 
What shape you please ; or the confectioner 
Who moulds his batch in shapes to suit the tastes 
Of customers who buy ; so you can make me 
That shape which sells the best. 

Irene. Then you shall be, 

Made into sugar-kisses, and I'll keep them. 
And only I shall taste them, (Kisses him.) 

Argo. infection ! 

Irene. confection sweet ! (Kisses him again.)' 

Argo. You joke when I would weep. 

Irene. You've wept too much already ; so have I, 
I came to break your heart and break my own, 
Or heal them both at oncej although unwomanly 
The action may appear. 

Argo. Are you my girl ? 

Irene. Heart, lungs and liver, every atom yours. 

Argo. Shall we renew our vows ? 

Irene. . It is superfluous; 

And yet perhaps His best, for those I made, 
Were doll babes of a child ; now I am grown 
And know the force of words ; and so I pledge* 
Undying love and duty. 

Argo. So I pledge 

Undying love to thee ; and furthermore 
I pledge myself to kick the seedy spook, 
Which men call genius, till he shabs away ; 
I'll starve with him no farther ; I will work * r 
At daily labor ; I will get a birth 
As brakeman on a hog train ; I'll achieve 
A little money ; then a house and lot ; 
A cow, a pig, a horse; what else? 

Irene. A wife ? 

Argo. Why, yes, a wife, when I have got a hom& 
To shelter and protect her ; not till then. 
I have mistook my calling and have tried 
To earn distinction by the force of mind, 



30 

While It has brought me supperless to bed, 
And I have borrowed money from a draymas, 
To buy my breakfast. Freight me not with talent 
Poor truck is genius in the open market ; 
I'll put my bones and muscles to the proof. 

Irene. noble Argo ; wise is your resolve ; 
For labor brings sweet sleep and peace of mind ; 
And it is right and honorable to labor ; 
And pleasant is a cottage with content ; 
And genius may put forth its tenderest flowers 
Bven in the poor man's hut. 

Argo. But hut of mine 

Will never know content, nor have a sleeper, 
Though wooed by weary limbs to soft repose, 
Whose slumbers will bring healing on their wings, 
To cure the heart ache ; for upon my pillow 
My Irene cannot rest ; she now is rich; 
She cannot take my poverty, nor I 
Assume her riches with dependent role — 

misery, I'll embrace thee ! 

Irene. Still the yellow devil, 

The epileptic spook that waits on thee, 
Doth trip thee up ! Be still and hear the truth. 

Argo. The truth ? The naked truth ? Why I will he&r 
And bray it to the moon on Dutchmen's horns I — 
It is that we did love, do love to-day ; 
That thou art rich, and I am poor and proud t 
I'll make a song of it; set to it music ; 
And have the nimble elbows in the orchestra, 
The groaning viol and the brazen horns, 
(Cheek splitters to Mienheer with the mustache ;) 
And crashing plates give to it hellish discord. 
The truth ! By all means give us truth ! Here's mote : 
The lack of money kept me from your arms, 
Excess of it will keep me from your arms ; 
As I had none I could not wed with you ; 
As you have much I cannot wed with you ; 
So money still must keep true love at bay, 
Whether we have it or wc have it not. 
Possession is as bad as want of it ; 
For either brings the other's evils with it, 
And works our bane. 

Irene. I have no money, Argo, 

You see me as I was before the marriage, 
That brought me wretchedness as well as riches , 
But I have not a dollar to my name, 
And am dependent on my mother now 
For sustenance of life. Oppressed with gloom 
And in desponding and dispeptic mood. 
And charging riches with my wretchedness, 

1 did determine to adjust the score, 



31 

And bo avenged on that which wrought my rain, 
And so I called a lawyer armed with quibbles, 
And 8tock of heretofores and long preambles ; 
Well timed whereases, the saids and aforesaid3 ; 
And did bequeath, devise, give and convey, 
Conformably to law's extremest letter, 
My whole possessions, moneys and effects, 
Unto a friend held clear ; and this the rather 
As it did place me on a footing level 
With my erratic poet. 

Argo. All but poet ; 

Talk not of poetry, for we are poor ; 
But the wise law permits the poor to marry ; 
If like cures like one's lack shall cure the other's ; 
And lest some other fat man comes 'n the way, 
I will espouse thee straight; let's to a ju&tice. 
Enter Serv. Two gentlemen wish to see you, sir. 
Argo. Bid them enter. [Exit Servant, 

^ Enter Publisher and Critic, bowing. 
Seek you private conference with me, gentlemen ? 

Pub. It is immaterial, I presume, I called to say that on 
a more careful examination of your work, my critic has decid- 
ed that its merits will commend it to the public. 

Critic. It is a fine production, sir. It will take well. My 
first examination was rather hasty. We have heaps of rub- 
bish to wade through, and a gem may sometimes escape notice. 
Argo. Do not popular names give currency to much rub- 
bish ? 

Critic. True. The public ear will tolerate much discordance 
from voices that have casually charmed it. 

Argo. Then there is more in the man than the matter. 
Critic. That is very true. Popular names gloss over much 
that is stupid. 

Pub. I have deposited ten thousand dollars in bank, sub- 
ject to your check, and if you still so desire, the work shall b& 
brought out. 

Argo. Very well, sir; proceed, [Exit Critic and Pub. 

A freak of fortune ; she may frown to-morrow ; 
Come hither, Pet; now happiness I have thee. 
(Embraces Irene.) 
Irene. But may I not your arguments employ, 
And plead your money and my lack of it 
In bar of marriage ? 

t Argo. No, no ; not to-day, 

I'll no more pleading ; bring me to the 'squire I 

Irene. But how about that hog-train and that bet ? — 
That lowing kine, whose lacteal supply, 
Was to afford your babies nutriment? 
And that sleek swine — must he untwist his tail, 
And squeal perpetual for buttermilk ? 
Your genius, also, that atarv'd spook which yea 



32 

Bid banish and abjure— will you recall him ? 

Argo. I will until he make me voluabje, 
And rich with proofs and pleadings to refute 
The slanders I have said against thy sex ; 
And till he bring and burn me up the arrows 
Which I have impotently fired at Fate ; 
Because I could not pry out the decrees 
He ever writes in cradle of the baby, 
To fashion its career— ftnd fought against them 
While inexorably each written role 
Was acting to the letter. I'll invoke 
The discontented ghost of poesy, 
Until he help me to undo much folly, 
In one grand flight ; and till the work be done, 
Give me fish diet only. 

SCENE V, A Cemetery, One Grave Stone inscribed. Major 
Magoon. Enter Servant Sam, and Dr. Abram Turner. 

Serv. Poah majah ; dar you is, while de crazy man h&b 
youh wife and money. 

Dr. Turner. Is dey married ? 

Serv. Dey is, and dey ought to be. Dey is boff alik«~ 
Don't belieb in God nor de debble. Dey is wus dan de heven 
Chinee. Arter dey was married he found out dat she had 
made ovah to him de majah's property soon as de bref was out 
ob de majah. Den he raved dreffui. Lub is powerful, as I 
knows, if I is culled. I lubed dat gal, but she called me a 
niggah. Ize bound to hab a white gal, howsevah. Ize not 
gwine to marry a niggah, if I is culled. 

Dr. Turner. Sam, de ole fellah sleepen dar was pisened. 
De crotum ile struck a function and killed him. (Exit. 

Enter Argo and Irene, streioing flowers on the Major's grave 

Irene. Peacs to the dead; from thine eternal sleep, 
Love nor ambition, lust nor avarice, 
Can never rouse thee. Rest thee in thy shroud, 
Whilst we who come to heaven by thy death, 
Will keep thy memory green. 

Argo. Rest ihee, poor man ; thou hadst thy little day f 
Thy little pleasures and thy schemes for more. 
It little recksjiim who doth sleep below, 
That I enjoy his revenues, his wife. 
The happiness of those who live and move 
Works no disquiet to the eternal sleeper, 
Nor does their wretchedness. We travelers 
Upon time's whirling train, have each our station, 
And are pitched off, while the swift train moves on- 
Her© is thy stopping place. 



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